Frontier(s) (Second Sight)

[levcore]

Watched the interviews, the lead actress has aged incredibly well, wow she's still stunning.

[Kakihara]

Bummer to read that this release doesn't look that good but that Second Sight did the best it could. My copy is held up with some preorders from OrbitDVD so I won't have this in my hands until next month. I know to temper my expectations but I hope it's not a waste of money since I already have the US DVD of it.

[CyberGhostface]

Originally Posted by Kakihara

Bummer to read that this release doesn't look that good but that Second Sight did the best it could. My copy is held up with some preorders from OrbitDVD so I won't have this in my hands until next month. I know to temper my expectations but I hope it's not a waste of money since I already have the US DVD of it.

If it helps there’s a lot of special features and the subtitles on the US DVD are crap. (One example: “I was betrothed to Hans” was “I was betrothed to providence.”)

[Rockercub]

Originally Posted by Peachfuzz

I did. And then I bought it on dvd. And then I bought it digitally. And now, I have this blu disc. The new blu is better than the previous dvd, as in it lacks that format's compression artifacts, but apart from that, it's pretty much the same. I'd say the disc looks identical to the HD digital version doing the rounds on Amazon & iTunes, etc. Which is to say, it's mucky. It's always looked mucky, and probably always will. I don't know if it's intentional, but I doubt it's ever going to look better (happy if I'm ever proven wrong on this). In this instance, I actually quite like the rough & ready look. It's how I associate the film. It matches the subject tone, and its execution.

I watched it last night, and this is pretty much my take on it. It felt purposeful to me. Although I did watch the interview with the cinematographer, and he said they were excited to film on 35mm, so you'd think he'd want the final product to look more filmic. But he also mentioned a lot of limitations in shooting, all the day-for-night stuff, for example. Anyways, the new subtitles alone are worth the purchase for me, but I'll have to read the essays in the booklet before deciding if I should have gotten the standard edition.

[GiorgioV]

Originally Posted by Rockercub

I watched it last night, and this is pretty much my take on it. It felt purposeful to me. Although I did watch the interview with the cinematographer, and he said they were excited to film on 35mm, so you'd think he'd want the final product to look more filmic. But he also mentioned a lot of limitations in shooting, all the day-for-night stuff, for example. Anyways, the new subtitles alone are worth the purchase for me, but I'll have to read the essays in the booklet before deciding if I should have gotten the standard edition.

I respectfully disagree on the "new subtitles alone are worth the purchase"
That price? I don't believe they are.

[Rockercub]

Originally Posted by GiorgioV

I respectfully disagree on the "new subtitles alone are worth the purchase"
That price? I don't believe they are.

That's why I said "for me." I mean, even setting aside the issue of PQ, most limited edition prices are pretty steep for casual fans of a movie these days. At least this one has a concurrent standard edition that's more reasonably priced.

[GiorgioV]

Originally Posted by Rockercub

That's why I said "for me." I mean, even setting aside the issue of PQ, most limited edition prices are pretty steep for casual fans of a movie these days. At least this one has a concurrent standard edition that's more reasonably priced.

... I was actually referring to the standard edition's price!

[Rockercub]

Originally Posted by GiorgioV

... I was actually referring to the standard edition's price!

Well, that's a no-brainer for me. I've spent far more for even less. But this is one of my core French Extremity favorites, so I have to have the best version. The extras are a nice bonus, and I guess I might as well have the box set too.

Originally Posted by Cinema84

IThe film ils (Them), which hasn't hit Blu-ray legitimately yet, also looks rough and video-y. Maybe it's a French thing. Someone needs to give those guys better cameras

Boy, you aren't kidding about that. Finally watched my copy tonight, and it was really bad. Much worse than Frontier(s). You could chalk it up to the camera, but even the credits and StudioCanal logo at the beginning looked like crap.

[kmhofmann]

Originally Posted by Kakihara

Bummer to read that this release doesn't look that good but that Second Sight did the best it could.

How did we end up with the assumption that "Second Sight did the best it could"? I don't think this has been established in any shape or form.

Originally Posted by Rockercub

I watched it last night, and this is pretty much my take on it. It felt purposeful to me. Although I did watch the interview with the cinematographer, and he said they were excited to film on 35mm, so you'd think he'd want the final product to look more filmic. But he also mentioned a lot of limitations in shooting, all the day-for-night stuff, for example.

This is not what projected 35mm prints would look like, not even close, regardless of potential limitations in shooting conditions or used film stock. It would not look anything like what we see on the Second Sight disc, which is clearly an egregiously processed DVD-era telecine master from many, many years ago.

Unless we get extremely compelling, irrefutable evidence that this is how it's meant to look for all eternity (e.g., post-production was done by a bunch of near-sighted baboons dialing up all filters at their disposal), I'll be damned if this can't be massively improved upon by re-scanning some kind of decent film element - even a projection print - followed by grading.

At this moment, there is zero such evidence. Any posts stating that "Dude, I think it's meant to look like that" are misleading and/or by people who are completely unfamiliar with the look of 35mm film, no matter how limited the shooting conditions were.

[Rockercub]

Originally Posted by kmhofmann

This is not what projected 35mm prints would look like, not even close, regardless of potential limitations in shooting conditions or used film stock. It would not look anything like what we see on the Second Sight disc, which is clearly an egregiously processed DVD-era telecine master from many, many years ago.

Unless we get extremely compelling, irrefutable evidence that this is how it's meant to look for all eternity (e.g., post-production was done by a bunch of near-sighted baboons dialing up all filters at their disposal), I'll be damned if this can't be massively improved upon by re-scanning some kind of decent film element - even a projection print - followed by grading.

At this moment, there is zero such evidence. Any posts stating that "Dude, I think it's meant to look like that" are misleading and/or by people who are completely unfamiliar with the look of 35mm film, no matter how limited the shooting conditions were.

Well, we have the word of someone who saw it in the theater. I hear what you're saying though, and yeah, it doesn't look filmic to me. But I also don't discount the possibility of "a bunch of near-sighted baboons dialing up all filters" in post and contributing to what we're seeing.

[LanceL]

The Deadpit guys over on YouTube said this Blu-ray looks great. And they are always honest. They told me so. Well, not about this Blu-ray, but about their honesty. They said they will always tell it like it is to them. But I think they're full of it a lot of the time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDSy9r81qh4&t=552s&ab_channel=DEADPITRADIO

[lateralspin]

only one more, À l'intérieur, and I am all set to marathon

[private_joker]

This release is absolutely shocking. If Second Sight couldn't secure elements worthy of releasing on Blu-ray they shouldn't have done it. Really annoyed by this. If they cared about their customers or their reputation they wouldn't have released it in that state. I won't be paying their premium prices again any time soon. Basically conning people

[Nguss]

The picture to me did not look much different to my dvd (just from a quick scan of the two in the same player) but the subtitles looked much better. If you have (or can get) the dvd and only are interested in the film then i can't think of a reason to get the blu. I still 'enjoyed' the film if that is the right word though.

[ScareBearDan]

To anyone who bought it, is it Region B locked?

[samlop10]

Watched this tonight and golly. I “enjoyed” it. Uber brutal and bloody, and definitely not for everyone, but i enjoyed the suspense and thriller elements. Definitely “torture porn”, but from all the films in that sub-genre this has been one of, if not the, ‘best’ one.

A mix of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Hostel, with a dash of Don’t Breathe and Wrong Turn (2020).

The picture quality definitely won’t win any awards. But the movie was released in 2007, and by then Digital Intermediates were pretty popular. It also has a bit of CGI and some color processing, so i do wonder if it was finished in a DI, if so that is likely the best that we can get. Because if the effects were done in a DI and not on film, then the film negatives are effectively unfinished and incomplete.

This is all conjecture, but SS never mentioned any sort of new master/restoration/transfer anyway. So I didn’t expect it to look great.


It is region B locked.

[Steel76]

Yeah, I remember this not looking great in the theater.
Not "28 Days Later" bad, but it sure looked like digital transfered to film.
Annoying at first, but just like with 28 days later, I quickly got caught up in the movie, and forgot about it.

Either this is the intended look, or they ran out of money, and had to do the post-production editing, FX etc on digital.

Maybe the original negative don't exists any longer, or the owners of the film, just don't want to spend the money, to go back and recreate the CGI FX, etc. for a new scan.
Or could it be, that it was partly shot on 35mm, but had to switch to digital at some time during the production due to cost? Seems like we might never get the info...